


All the Glories of Fortune

by unintelligiblescreaming



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort later on, Banter, Caliginous Romance | Kismesis, Childhood, Companionable Snark, Cute, F/F, Fluff, Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Friendship, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Pre-Sburb/Sgrub
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-04
Updated: 2018-08-09
Packaged: 2018-11-23 12:35:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 9,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11402520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unintelligiblescreaming/pseuds/unintelligiblescreaming
Summary: Nepeta looks around your hive. "Wow," she says.You grin and toss your hair over your shoulder. "Yes, well, I guess it is pretty aweso—""I mean, this place is even messier than Equihiss'! I didn't think that waspawsible."--In which a troll by the name of Vriska Serket has a terrible wrigglerhood, the terribleness of which is mitigated somewhat by the introduction of one Nepeta Leijon and the troll disease known as friendship, leading to a variety of more positive life choices.Featuring the protagonist's agonizing inability to recognize a crush, a budding moirallegiance with Terezibeforethe Game starts, meowrails being meowrails, the development of Vriska's strange yet STRONG friendship with Equius, and a total lack of any revenge cycles whatsoever.





	1. Opening Gambit

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS: references to vriska's terrible lusus that become more direct in later chapters, and continuous casual discussion of violent deaths, often of young people. later on this fic will go into both canon and au versions of the events during the game both pre- and post-retcon, which will involve major character death but NOT permanently.

Your name is Vriska Serket, you are not quite five sweeps old, and you have two kids’ corpses in your sylladex and you’re headed back home to feed them to your mom. Eridan got one of them with his dumb fancy rifle and you took out the other with your super cool FLARPing sword, and usually you only get one kill every week or so, which means this is really good! You wonder if maybe, just maybe, your mom will be proud.  
  
You come around the hill and see your hive outlined tall and dark against the sky. That’s when you spot the troll sitting against a tree nearby.  
  
That’s weird, because strangers never come around here, and this definitely isn’t someone you recognize. She’s about your age, with cute little horns that match the meow beast lusus curled up next to her, and her clothes are ragged and dirt-smudged—an oversized olive green jacket pulled over a t-shirt and shorts. Is she feral or something?  
  
“Hey,” you say. “What are you doing here?”  
  
If you were able to prevent yourself from sticking your nose into other people’s business, your name wouldn’t be Vriska Serket.  
  
The troll jumps to her feet at the sound of your voice. “Hello!” She bounds forward to meet you, and your jaw drops as she proceeds to get so far up in your personal space that her hair brushes your collarbone. She even prods your shoulder curiously, examining you like she’s never seen another person before in her life. Everything from her wide round eyes to her sneaker-clad toes quivers with energy.  
  
She still hasn’t answered your question, so you try again. “Are you lost?”  
  
The girl hesitates. “Purrhaps,” she admits. “My furiend said I should meet him here, but I don’t see him anywhere.”  
  
Okay, she’s definitely lost. The only reason anyone would send their hatefriend to a location within a one-mile radius of your hive is if they wanted to get them killed. People trade horror stories about you and your lusus on the forums. _My friend’s moirail’s auspistice’s matesprit did a FLARP campaign against the cerulean who lives over there and she never heard from him again!_ It’s getting a lot harder to find food these nights, and uh, mom is not happy about it…  
  
But you don’t want to think about that.  
  
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure you’re in the wrong place,” you say.  
  
“These are definitely the coordinates he gave me, though,” she says. Kinda sucks for her, since it means her friend is definitely out to get her—the only person who lives close by is Equius Zahhak, and there’s no way that stuck-up snob invited anyone lower than teal to his hive. “I’m Nepeta, by the way! Nepeta Leijon.”  
  
She’s looking up at you with a big, open smile like Stranger Danger is simply not a possibility in her mind. Wow, alright. Every bone in your body is telling you that this is a great opportunity to score a third dead kid for mom’s dinner and make her _really_ impressed. (Though Leijon’s front canines do look oddly sharp…)  
  
But. Well. There’s something about her that just… you don’t know. You kinda don’t want to stop talking to her. It’s a weird feeling, but not a bad one, exactly.  
  
You think this would be a great moment to say something really witty, except your thinksponge has temporarily stopped working and instead your mouth just sort of flops open like a fish. Great job, brain!  
  
Her rather large meowbeast lusus uncurls and stretches, then sniffs in your direction. Then the lusus hisses, showing all her teeth, and jumps in between you and her wriggler.  
  
“Pounce, stop! Down!” says Nepeta, patting at her lusus, who ignores her and growls, low and threatening. You glare at Pounce, and when you don’t step away— _oookay_ that snap of the jaws nearly took a chunk out of your leg.  
  
“Ooh, I hope she didn’t get mew, did she? I’m pawfully sorry about that, I don’t know what’s got her fur riled up like this. She’s so funny sometimes. It’s like she furgets I have these!” And her strife deck equips her with claw extenders nearly a foot and a half long. She swipes them through the air with a _shing_ sound.  
  
Your eyes track the glint of the blades. They moved fast, faster than anything you’ve seen on a troll in melee combat. She could fillet you with them before you could even reach for your specibus. “Hhhnng,” you say, and then remember how to do words. “I’m. I’m Vriska.”  
  
She nods thoughtfully. “That’s a nice name. I’ll call you Vriskers.”  
  
“What? No, that’s lame!”  
  
“It’s _not_ lame. It’s a cat pun.”  
  
“So? That makes it lamer.”  
  
Nepeta frowns, because that is the height of compelling rhetoric when you are five sweeps old.  
  
There’s a twinge in the pit of your stomach. You liked it better when she was smiling. You shuffle your feet and say, “Your claw things are kind of cool, I guess. But I think your hatefriend wants me to kill you.”  
  
She stares at you blankly for a long moment. Then she says, “…what?”  
  
“Weeeell, my lusus—”  
  
You’re interrupted by frantic footsteps coming up the hill behind you. There’s the sound of someone huffing for breath, and then a bellowing voice: “SERKET— _hff_ —DON’T YOU— _hff_ —DARE—”  
  
Nepeta’s eyes light up. “Equihiss!” she says, and leaps past you.  
  
You turn around just in time to see Zahhak get tacklepounced to the ground. The smaller troll connects with his upper torso, his arms pinwheel wildly, and then his shoes slip on the dewy grass and he goes over backward. “The mighty huntress accosts her sneaky, elusive prey!” Nepeta says happily, rubbing her face against his horns.  
  
“Wait, you guys actually know each other?” you say, as Pounce prowls up to the two of them and curls up near Equius’ head, purring.  
  
Equius tries to say something, but all that comes out is a feeble wheeze. Nepeta finally notices that he can’t breathe and eases off his windpipe. He coughs out, “This is the first time we’ve met in person. Now, Nepeta, you must cease this. It is unseemly.”  
  
“Nooo, don’t wanna!”  
  
“You must.”  
  
“But I don’t wanna.”  
  
“But you must.”  
  
“I don’t want to,” she insists, and flops across his chest. He doesn’t seem to mind, just pats her back gently. Or rather, he pats the air above her. You guess he’s worried about his superstrength.  
  
You feel like your confused mind is splitting into eight hundred even more confused pieces. “Okay, okay, back up. You really invited her to your hive?” And since they’re clearly very familiar with each other, why haven’t you heard about her earlier? You and Equius aren’t exactly joined at the hip, but you have his trollian handle and you chat all the time. Granted, most of the conversations involve him calling you improper and you calling him a loser, but it was only hatefriendly ribbing. Or at least you thought it was hatefriendly. You feel kind of upset. Or at least you would if you were a sucker who felt stupid things like that, you remind yourself.

“I am so sorry,” Equius says, but not to you. “I meant to be here to meet you, but I lost track of the time. I didn’t intend for you to run into Serket.”  
  
“I’m right here, you know,” you say.  
  
“Yes, I’m aware. And if you try to turn my friend into sustenance for your lusus, then I will…” He hesitates, apparently remembering that you FLARP on a nightly basis and he can’t even shoot an arrow. “I will be very stern indeed,” he says, fixing you with what he probably thinks is an intimidating glare.  
  
You snort. “Yeah, no, I’d be more worried about Leijon here. Your claw extenders are kind of cool, by the way. Not as cool as my specibus, but pretty neat. Have you ever tried FLARPing?”  
  
“Of course she hasn’t,” snaps Equius, at the same time that Nepeta says, “Ooh, I’d love to!”  
  
They frown at each other. Equius says “Those games are fatal,” as if that’s some kind of deterring factor.  
  
“I can handle it.”  
  
“It’s too dangerous.”  
  
“It's not.”  
  
“Yes it is.”  
  
She sticks her tongue out at him. “You’re no fun.”  
  
“I strictly forbid you from it,” he says, and she rolls her eyes to show just how much she thinks of that statement. He stands up slowly and the smaller troll slides off him with a _humph_. “Dawn is coming soon, we should get inside.”  
  
As if on cue, there’s a stirring in the back of your mind. A click-clack-growl, and then mom’s voice echoes through your pancase. _Why aren’t you at hive yet, wriggler? I’m hungry._  
  
You flip your hair over your shoulder, trying to indicate that you could care less about Equius and his visitor, no matter how curious you actually are. “Siiigh. I’ve got better things to do then hang with you two losers. See ya later, I guess.”  
  
“Yes we will!” Nepeta says.  
  
“No, we most certainly will not,” says Equius.  
  
“But I want to talk to Vriskers,” she says, and you’re caught between wincing because of that dumb nickname and grinning because—well—she wants to talk to you.  
  
Equius grimaces. “But—listen—argh. We can talk about this inside.” The sunrays are already creeping over the trees and it’s getting uncomfortably hot, which means it's probably a lot worse for him and his icky sweaty problem. He nods formally to you. “Good day.” Then he carefully takes hold of Nepeta’s sleeve and begins tugging her away.  
  
Nepeta stumbles after him and waves over her shoulder. “My chat handle is arsenicCatnip!” she calls, and then they disappear into the trees.  
  
  
*  
  
  
\--  arachnidsGrip [AG] began trolling arsenicCatnip [AC] \--  
  
AG: Hey.  
AC: :33 < *nepeta gasps in happy surprise*  
AC: :33 < *she wonders if this is the nice girl she met with the funny pupils in her eye*  
AG: Yep, that’s me! ::::)  
AC: :33 < *the kitty cat knows her furriend thinks vriskers is dangerous but she doesnt care*  
AC: :33 < *she wants to hang out anyway*  
AC: :33 < but probably not flarp right now, usually i dont pay attention to what equihiss tells me to do but i think if i try flarping he might have a bloodpusher attack or something :(  
AG: Hoooooooold up one second. Are you into roleplaying?  
  
Two hours later, Nepeta has managed to cajole you into making a spidersona.

 


	2. Some Kind of 8IG DEAL

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you can also [reblog](http://unintelligible-screaming.tumblr.com/post/162651085577/unintelligible-screaming) this on tumblr if that's your thing!

\-- arachnidsGrip [AG] began trolling centaursTesticle [CT] \--  
  
AG: So what gives?  
CT: D-> What are you talking about  
AG: Ooooooookaaaaaaaay, I was referring to your surprise guest who you are letting stay in your hive for some reason, 8ut now I want to know what’s up with that thing in front of your text.  
CT: D-> Are you referring to the bow and arrow?  
AG: Yes, o8viously, dum8fuck!  
CT: D-> It is just something that Nepeta has suggested I try out  
CT: D-> Hmm  
CT: D-> In fact  
CT: D --> I think it 100ks better if I add an e%tra dash  
AG: Well I think it looks really fucking weird.  
CT: D --> How fortunate then that I do not care what you think  
CT: D --> And how many times must I ask you to stop with the 100d language  
AG: Hmmmmmmmm. Let me think a8out it! How a8out… NO.  
CT: D --> I knew it was a lost cause but I had to try  
CT: D --> Besides, the bow and arrow is a dignified symbol that matches my hatchsign  
AG: Dignified? It’s one step away from r8leplaying.  
CT: D --> No, it most definitely is not  
CT: D --> It is not anywhere near roleplaying  
CT: D --> In fact, it is so far from roleplaying that I e%pect if you take the canyon to the south of here, the distance from the top to the bottom is minuscule in comparison to the distance between a simple bow and arrow symbol and the act of roleplaying  
AG: Ouch, did I hit a nerve there? ::::)  
AG: Anyw8ys, it wasn’t supposed to 8e an insult! Roleplay is fun and cool. It looks like Leijon is doing a good jo8 at extracting that stick up your ass.  
CT: D --> That imagery makes me uncomfortable  
AG: You’re no fun.  
CT: D --> Perhaps I sh00ld be worried that you and Nepeta sound so similar  
AG: No we don’t! We’ve 8een talking all night and we’re t8tally different. Don’t tell her I said this, 8ut she’s kind of a wimp! She’s only ok8y with 8loodshed if it’s wild lusii or something.  
AG: I told her a8out what Eridan and Feferi do to the non-wild kind of lusii, that are little kids’ guardians and everything, and she acted like it was some kind of 8IG DEAL.  
AG: 8ut it’s alright. Otherwise she has a lot of good ideas.  
AG: I’m already planning all the games we’re going to play together.  
CT: D --> You are not to induct her into your f00lish FLARPing, and that is a command  
AG: 8luh to your command! We’re going to have fun and you can’t stop us. Wanna guess how much fun we’re going to have?  
CT: D --> She’s returning to her hive in a few nights, so thankfully you won’t have time to rope her into getting herself killed  
AG: We’re going to have aaaaaaallllllll the fun. AAAAAAAALLLLLLLL of it!!!!!!!!  
CT: D --> That is the fifth or sixth time you have subje%ed me to that turn of phrase in the last week alone  
AG: Ugh, why are you so 8oring. Why do you assume she’ll get killed? *I’m* not culled yet, am I?  
CT: D --> Simply because you have been subjected to a bad situation does not mean you should endeavor to drag other trolls down with you  
  
\-- centaursTesticle [CT] ceased trolling arachnidsGrip [AG] \--  
  
And then he just logs out, like that last line is some kind of _coup de grace_ or whatever Eridan would call it (except Eridan couldn’t pronounce it and spent half a sweep saying “coop day grays” until someone linked him to the dictionary entry and he punched his desk so hard it broke). You slam down the lid of your husktop with unnecessary force—no, you correct yourself, it’s _just the right amount_ of force considering the level of bullshit you’re dealing with!!!!!!!! Why can’t he leave you alone?  
  
In any case, he doesn’t have much to worry about. Nepeta can’t play any live-action stuff because she’s going back to her hive soon (which is a cave or something? You don’t really know), and to be completely honest you’re not sure she has it in her to straight-up cull someone in cold blood. You told her about Gl’bgolyb and she said that was okay as long as the animals were wild and didn’t have wrigglers, and you said that usually they _did_ have wrigglers, and she thought that was mean. After that you, uh, sort of didn’t get around to explaining what exactly your mom eats—only for her to interrupt you and explain that Equius had told her everything. That had been an awkward ten minutes, for sure.  
  
But if you really scour your memory, this isn’t the first time Equius has mentioned Nepeta. This is just the first time her name has entered the conversation.  
  
  
**(almost one sweep ago)**  
  
Try as you might, there are some things in life you simply cannot avoid, and one of them is your weird neighbor.  
  
You and Equius have known each other since forever. You used to have other neighbors, but mom ate them on the nights when you failed and couldn’t bring her anything. Once you asked why she didn’t eat him too, and after a long, ominous pause, she said … _too sweaty._  
  
He’s so annoying! HIs blood is a shade purpler than yours, and boy does he know it. The hemocaste worship thing only got yuckier and sweatier as you got older, and every time you talk to him you want to scrub off your skin with steel wool.  
  
But despite all that, the two of you are friendly. Hatefriendly, at least. You have each others’ trollian handles, and you see him in person most evenings out of the week. There’s a patch of trees that you usually flounce past when you go out to fuck up some idiot’s night, and he’s always there trying to shoot arrows into a target pinned to a tree.  
  
You say something like “What’s up, dork,” and he says something like “I will not allow your uncouth address to deter me from my purpose,” and you trade a few words about what you’ve been doing lately, and you finish by asking “What kind of archeradicator can’t even get an arrow to leave a bowstring?” and he responds with something like “Serket, while your propensity for violence is appropriate, neigh, even admirable, cruelty is not clever and will certainly never land you any quadrants.”  
  
He’s kinda fun to talk to, you guess. You don’t talk to a lot of people.

Well, you do, but the conversation is usually along the lines of “Please, please, oh, please don’t cull me” and then some witty repartee on your end (or at least what you personally believe is witty repartee), and then a final anguished scream as you finish them off. There’s Eridan and maybe Feferi, but she doesn’t seem to like you much, and you guess there’s apocalypseArisen who you occasionally chat with about apocalypse buff things, but other than that, well, you don't have anyone else.  
  
One night you walk past the tree line, open your mouth to deliver a tremendously original insult such as “hey nerd,” and stop in your tracks.  
  
The pile of broken bows and arrows is gone. Equius is there like usual, but instead of pacing and growling angrily to himself, he’s sitting on a picnic blanket and eating a grubloaf sandwich. His dumb butler-horse-thing lusus lounges peacefully a few feet away.  
  
“What the fuck,” you say. You have recently discovered the concept of swearing.  
  
He nods his head calmly in greeting.  
  
“What the _fuck,_ ” you repeat.  
  
“I am enjoying a nice meal outside,” he says. “Would you care to join me?”  
  
“What—I’m—you look _relaxed._ Who are you and what have you done with Equius Zahhak?”  
  
“I have simply decided to vary my activity schedule. Tonight I’ve decided to engage in a pastime that helps me enjoy life.”  
  
“So you’ve given up on trying to be an archerada-whatever?” You know how to pronounce it, but usually saying it wrong makes him mad, and that’s kinda funny.  
  
He doesn't rise to the bait. “Of course not. I’ll resume my self-training once I am in a more positive frame of mind. It has been drawn to my attention that I have been rather tense lately.”  
  
“You finally took me up on my advice to loosen up?”  
  
He sniffs. “I never have and never will lend any credence to your wrigglerish insults. Do try to grasp the fact that you are not the center of the universe.”  
  
“Could’ve fooled me,” you shoot back. “So who’s your mystery advice-giver, huh?”  
  
This is when he makes a serious tactical error. He blushes bright blue and says, “It’s none of your business.”  
  
The instant those words reach your auricular shell, finding out about this new mystery troll becomes your new goal in life.  
  
The first time you ask him, he tells you to go away and exercise respect for your blood superiors. You throw a clod of dirt at him. He looks betrayed.  
  
The second time he says, “No, I will not tell you her name, I—”  
  
“So it’s a _her!”_  
  
“Serket, you will cease this at once.”  
  
“Fat chance, horse boy. Does she live nearby?” If so, you’ll probably meet her in the form of a ‘coontime snack for your lusus.  
  
He gets all huffy and pointedly ignores you for a while, which leaves you in a disgruntled state for a few nights. The third time you prod him about it he groans and says, “Fine. Her blood is lower than mine and she lives in the forest forty or fifty miles south of here. Is that sufficient for your extreme curiosity?”  
  
“Tell me her naaaame,” you say, but he goes “Harrumph!” and crosses his arms.  
  
“I bet you have a cruuush on her.”  
  
“I have no such thing. You will remove yourself from my presence.”  
  
This would have gone on for considerably longer, but in an uncharacteristic move, Equius held firm. You didn’t drag any new information out of him and eventually you got bored and forgot about the whole thing.  
  
  
**(in the present)**  
  
You just wish you knew why he was being so cagey! It’s not like you were going to kill her or anything.  
  
Well, maybe. Once you got to know her, that is.


	3. Entente

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> meowrails meowrails meowrails!!! plus vriska at the end.

Your name is Equius Zahhak, and Nepeta is smaller than you thought she would be. Her horns barely come up to your chin. She’s also louder than you thought she would be, especially when you’re arguing about dinner.  
  
“That’s hopbeast food,” she declares, arms crossed. Her face is scrunched up—there’s no way around the simile—like an offended cat.  
  
“It’s not. It’s full of vegetables and nourishing vitamins. Would you really rather eat some kind of outdoors-living beast?”  
  
“Yes! I’ve never eaten a vegetable before in my life and I’m not starting now.”  
  
You stare at her. “You’ve never… how are you alive?”  
  
“I could say the same thing for you. I don’t know how you’ve survived this long, if you’ve never even fought anything besides a robot you made yourself,” she says, tucking her feet up on her chair in contravention of all rules of propriety. She pokes her plate with a claw like it’s liable to explode. “Listen, I’ll eat a few bites of these ridiculous green things, but only beclaws you asked. Tomorrow I’m hunting my own meal.”  
  
“I suppose I owe you that.”  
  
“But seriously, why do you care so much about not eating meat?”  
  
“Beasts are noble things which—”  
  
“Don’t give me that! You eat grubloaf all the time. I’ve seen you.”  
  
“That’s grubloaf.”  
  
“Well, what do you think that’s made of?”  
  
“Grubloaf material, clearly.”  
  
“Don’t you know what grubloaf material is?”  
  
You give a sort of half-shrug that endeavors to communicate a general knowledgeable attitude while avoiding admitting that you don’t, in point of fact, know what grubloaf is made out of.  
  
She tells you.  
  
You know your face must have gone ashen because you are dizzy from all the blood that has drained from it. Your mouth hangs open in horror. You think you might be sick.  
  
“Oh my god,” she says, rising half out of her chair. “Oh my god, are you okay? Did I break you? This is not how I imagined this would go—”  
  
“I need a moment,” you say hoarsely (a guilty part of your brain is secretly pleased at the word choice of your internal monologue). You rush out of the dining block and spend several minutes leaning over the toilet, trying to ignore the images flashing through your mind in vivid technicolor. Sandwich meat made of actual _grubs_ , urgh argh ack—  
  
She knocks on the door. “Hey, are you alright in there?”  
  
You don’t respond.  
  
“I brought you your plate of leafy hopbeast food and your lupus gave me a glass of milk if you want it.” She pauses. “I… could get you a towel? Wait, you’re in the ablution block, you have plenty of towels. And you’re probably not hungry. I’m not very good at this.”  
  
“I’m in the what?” you croak.  
  
“The ablutions block. Well, I’m sooor-reeee if my words aren’t fancy enough for you!” There’s another long pause where she’s silent and you concentrate on not throwing up. Then she says, “Do you want to talk about something else?”  
  
“Anything else, please.”  
  
“Alright. I talked to Vriskers again today,” she says, which makes you want to throw up for an entirely different reason.  
  
“What I don’t understand is why you would want to do that.” Ordering her not to didn’t work at all, and Serket seems worryingly intent on furthering the acquaintanceship. Ordinarily you wouldn’t mind the cobalt-blood, but this is not an ordinary situation.  
  
“She likes roleplaying.”  
  
“And I like not having to constantly picture my moirail being torn apart by a giant arachnid,” you snap, and then you realize what you said and you want to _die._  
  
By the time you hear the door open, your face is buried in your hands, a blush is threatening to overtake your entire upper body, and in your head you’ve already run through six best-case scenarios in which you perish on the spot from sheer embarrassment. You risk a glance. Nepeta’s cheeks are smushed into a tiny section of open doorway and her hair is rumpled in the silliest manner possible. Her eyes are big with surprise and something else you can’t quite name.  
  
“Sorry,” you mutter. “It just slipped out.”  
  
“You really mean that? Moirail?”  
  
Her eyes grow even wider. You feel a wave of nervous sweating coming on. “I—yes,” you say.  
  
She squeals and bursts in, tackling you in a hug so fierce that your horns knock into the counter. Whether your dizziness is from that or from pure relief and giddiness, you’re not sure. You raise a hand and pat her back as lightly as possible. She’s cutting off your windpipe again. You’ve never felt happier in your life.  
  
  
*  
  
  
Your name is Vriska Serket, and you’re pretty sure you have a new friend! Or something close, anyway.  
  
It’s not long before Nepeta takes Pounce and begins the trek back to her hive to the south. She chats with you on trollian the entire time, despite the lack of any logical source of wifi whatsoever. Equius sends her off with a blue beanie that fits over her horns, which looks like a quadranting gift to you (as you remarked to him at the top of your lungs) but which he claims is only so that if she meets anyone hostile on the journey the aggressor might see his color and leave her alone.  
  
It’s true that there are trolls who wouldn’t think twice at lashing out at an olive but would hesitate to attack someone with a blueblood’s protection, but personally you think Nepeta can handle pretty much anything. The only people who could give her trouble are those who are _really_ good at culling, like you, who know that trolls may bleed different but they all die the same.  
  
And things are different.  
  
They just—are. What, do people expect you to have some kind of poetic statement about the changes in your life ready to roll out from the tip of your tongue? You play games and argue about your characters and she chews you out for being too mean while she’s just trying to have fun and you make snippy remarks back and you refuse to talk to each other for a week, then end up messaging each other through some coincidence or another and somehow you end up back on track again.  
  
You want her to try FLARPing, and she goes hmm and umm and says she lives too far away, and you say that you’ll come over there then, and she says oh but Equius says she can’t, and you ask when has she ever listened to him? Then she says it’s too dangerous and you say it’ll only be a campaign between friends, maybe you and Eridan on one team and Nepeta and that Aradia girl you occasionally talk to on the other, and finally Nepeta says:  :33 < listen i know you wanna do this really badly but i don’t think this is going to work, can’t we just stick with text games like always?  
  
You type back: Whatever! If you want to play lame games for wrigglers all 8y yourself then that’s fine 8y me!!!!!!!  
  
And you don’t talk for a perigee.  
  
You spend a lot of time sitting in your respiteblock and switching between glowering at your husktop screen and glowering at the wall.

The next time you head down to the seashore, Eridan goes up to you and says, “What’s glubbed up your gills this time? Oh wait, you don’t have any—” So you elbow him in the side of his thorax and he doubles over gasping. You take the opportunity to punch him in the fin.  
  
He launches himself at you in revenge the moment he recovers. You have an all-out brawl that ends with him tripping you into falling over the side of his ~~cool~~ stupid shipwreck, arms flailing. He sticks his tongue out at you and disappears underwater to take his most recent kill back to Feferi, leaving you screaming “I’ll get you for that, Dualscar!” and hugging a piece of driftwood to stay afloat. (You can’t swim.)  
  
That morning you slump back your hive, drenched and exhausted and feeling slightly better despite your wrigglerish determination to stay as bitterly miserable as possible. Your clothes are still soaked, though. You briefly consider going to Equius’ hive and asking for a towel, but decide against it because ewww. Instead you head up to the roof and laze around in the warm moonlight in the hope that it’ll help you dry off.  
  
That’s when you see Nepeta’s tiny figure coming up over the hill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my tumblr is [unintelligible-screaming](http://unintelligible-screaming.tumblr.com/) and you can reblog [this](http://unintelligible-screaming.tumblr.com/post/162695497022/unintelligible-screaming) post if you want (it's a link to this fic plus a bit of commentary). thank you for reading!!


	4. The Best Defense Is a Good Offense

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> had some trouble with this chapter, so it's shorter than the others. the next one will definitely be longer.

What’s she doing here?  
  
Heading to Equius’ house, apparently. You watch from up high as she goes to knock on his door. She’s far enough away that she’s only barely distinguishable by her jacket and hat, but you can see her twitch impatiently when no one comes to the door. After a while she knocks again, then tries throwing pebbles at the window. It seems like no one’s home.  
  
You nearly turn around and go back inside—he’ll turn up sooner or later, and at the moment your stubbornness and determination to give Nepeta the cold shoulder are outweighing your eternal desire for attention. Your claws are opening the latch to the trapdoor (what kind of self-respecting troll wouldn’t have a trapdoor in their hive?) when you hear a sound like _rumble-scritch-scritch._  
  
You freeze. The sound is familiar to you, and hearing it sends your pulse pounding, makes your head dizzy. You feel like it’s reaching into your body and turning your limbs to ice. It’s from the crevice deep in the earth where Spidermom lives, and it means she’s coming out.  
  
You haven’t fed her tonight. You gave her the losers of a particularly satisfying campaign a few weeks ago, and she was full enough that you thought you could rest for a bit. But now a lone troll is wandering close by, and the scent is being carried by the wind.  
  
A long white leg comes into view around the side of the hive, then another. The rumbling gets louder but Nepeta doesn’t look up. She’s concentrating on a palmhusk, it looks like, probably contacting Equius. That’s fine, it’s nearly dawn and you’re sure he’ll be climbing up the hill at any second now.  
  
Except you haven’t seen him in a few nights, have you? Didn’t he mention something about planning for a long hunting trip?  
  
Your lusus’ head emerges from the earth, mandibles gnashing. You flinch, then berate yourself for acting like a little wriggler. You’re Mindfang’s descendant, you can do this. But mom is going to spot Nepeta any moment now, and—  
  
And what? It’s not your problem. If she gets eaten then it’s her own fault for not running fast enough, and it would serve her right, wouldn’t it, after she…  
  
After she…  
  
What did she do to you again?  
  
It all seemed very logical sixty seconds ago.  
  
Spidermom has found her quarry. She surges across the grass, legs digging deep furrows in the earth. Nepeta finally notices. She scrambles backward, but still, you’ve seen this happen enough times to know that she has only a few more seconds before it’s all over.  
  
Your body moves before you form any conscious intentions. Your hive is three stories tall but there’s a drainpipe at the edge of the roof and you’re small enough that it can hold your weight. You use it to swing downward and catch the edge of the balcony on the second floor. From there it’s too far to jump all the way but you see a ledge five feet to the left and down, and the distance is risky but you _juuuuust_ barely make it.  
  
You wobble on the edge for a moment, then regain your balance and jump to the ground. You sprint.

Nepeta is backed up against a tree. You see mom’s jagged maw coming down, and you get in the way.  
  
Mom slows. You feel tiny in front of her, like you’re two sweeps old again. You look up and up and up at her white carapace and eight hard eyes and throw your arms in front of you. _STOP!_ you think at her, pouring every ounce of psychic strength you possess into those four letters.  
  
_Don’t be foolish, wriggler,_ she says back, in her hissing, scratching mind-voice.  
  
_Fine, fine, I know you’re hungry! I’ll get you something tomorrow! But not this troll!_  
  
A long, aching pause. You experience the terrible sensation of someone rifling through your thoughts. You’re never sure if it’s reality or paranoia. She says, _Don’t disappoint,_ and drenches your thinkpan in a burst of frustration and disdain. Then, slowly, she turns around and retreats to her cavern in the cold earth.  
  
Your breathing is ragged. In your head you’re daring Nepeta to mention it, forming all the nasty retorts you can make if she comments on how shaken you are.  
  
“That was a close one, huh?” she says.  
  
“I had it handled,” you snap. She just blinks at you and tilts her head. You grind your teeth. “Let’s just get inside before mom comes back out again.”  
  
She doesn’t argue.


	5. Purractically Required

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember how i said this chapter would be longer than the others? i lied. it got long enough that i split it into two chapters for consistency.
> 
> this section's really fun to write, btw.

You practically shove her through the door. She catches herself nimbly and dashes up the stairs. (There are stairs everywhere in your hive, especially the winding kind. What kind of self-respecting troll wouldn’t have winding stairs in their hive?)  
  
You slam the door. There are eight thousand emotions boiling inside you, and you’re breathing hard, and it’s anyone’s guess which particular feeling is going to win out this time. _Don’t disappoint,_ mom told you, and you don’t know how to do that. You never know how.  
  
You whirl around. “What did you think you were doing?” you snap. “I thought you and Zahhak were best buddies, shouldn’t you have, I don’t know, asked him if he was going to be around? He won’t be back for nights. And it’s nearly sunrise. You’d be spider food if it weren’t for me.”  
  
She shrugs awkwardly with one shoulder. “Didn’t have my husktop.”  
  
You feel like your pancase is going to explode from sheer force of idiocy. “You didn’t have your husktop? What, you thought, ‘Hey, I’ll just go and have a quick fifty-mile walk in the brisk sunshine! No need to take essential survival materials’? Brilliant!”  
  
“Well, I—I had to leave fast,” she says, and you notice she isn’t looking at you directly. It’s odd. The last time you were around her, she met your gaze so intently that you felt more alive, more important, merely from the pressure of her attention.  
  
You saunter forward, trying to act casual ~~and failing~~. Something’s up and you want to know what. It might be a trick of your imagination, but Nepeta looks scruffier than before. Her pants are torn, her jacket has holes in the sleeves, and there are scrapes and bruises on her knuckles. Plus her hair is strewn with twigs, but you think that’s normal for her. “Why the hurry?”  
  
She frowns. “It’s weird and complicated.”  
  
“And?”  
  
She turns away, ignoring your question. She cranes her neck, apparently examining your hive. "Wow," she says.  
  
You’re caught a little off-guard, but you grin anyways and toss your hair over your shoulder. "Yes, well, I guess it is pretty aweso—"  
  
"I mean, this place is even messier than Equihiss'! I didn't think that was pawsible.”  
  
Your smile drops. “You live in a _cave.”_  
  
“At least I clean it. Do you even know what a trash can is? Is that not part of your schoolfeeds?”  
  
“If you don’t like it, then you’re free to leave.” You gesture to the window, where a ray of scorching sunlight is seeping dimly through the darkened glass. “Oh wait, you would die! I notice you haven’t thanked me for saving your life, by the way.”  
  
“I’ll say thank you when you apawlogize for ignoring me for a perigee.”  
  
“Oh, are you _really_ going to bring that up?”  
  
“You got really mad for no purreason and blocked me. You’re mean all the time and you say everyone should be tough enough to handle it, but then you go and fureak out the moment someone says no to you—”  
  
“Ughhh. If I say sorry will you get off my case?”  
  
“Sure! I just wish you’d be a little self-aware. At all. In any way.”  
  
“Fine. Soooorrrry.” You drag it out flippantly, and Nepeta rolls her eyes.  
  
What follows is silence. It starts comfortable but gets awkward as time passes and you realize that the two of you are just standing there, shuffling slightly, your foyer with nothing to do. At some point you decide you should break the silence, but then become irrationally convinced that if the comment you make is any less than devastatingly clever it will spell the end of any ounce of respect anyone has ever had for you, so you spend three minutes frantically trying to think of a quippy remark before Nepeta finally says something.  
  
“We’re having a sleepover, right?” she says. “The weirdest, most awkward sleepover efur. That’s basically what’s happurrning.”  
  
“Happurning is a stupid pun.”  
  
“It is not and you don’t know anything about cat puns anyway,” she says. “Look, how about you show me some of your drawings?”  
  
“What? Why?”  
  
“Beclaws it’ll be fun, obviously. C’mon, I sent you some of mine.”  
  
After a certain amount of blustering, you show her the character sketches hanging up around your respiteblock. There are some detours before that, as you’re struck with the urge to show her especially cool features of the hive (which has nothing to do with nerves over showing her your art, shut up _shut up_ , even if her drawings have this shading thing going on that you haven’t figured out yet and you really hope she doesn’t say anything about it). You want to show her your giant hoard of treasure from your many FLARP campaigns, but then you remember there’s a giant olive-green bloodstain there from… an incident… and you avoid that block at the last minute.  
  
Now she’s examining your latest Mindfang drawing. “It’s just a sketch,” you say quickly.  
  
“I like it,” says Nepeta, and you feel inexplicably warm. The blue blush suffusing your face is obviously just a trick of the light. Obviously. She asks, “Didn’t you say your FLARP outfit was based on this?”  
  
“Yep! It’s over here.” You show her proudly, bolstered by the success of your artwork, and start babbling about period-typical dress and seagrift history and why Eridan is so wrong about the effectiveness of the Alternian naval fleet during that time. She asks questions at all the right places and looks suitably intimidated when you describe the Marquise’s coolest naval battle complete with sweeping hand gestures and sound effects, and it’s… it’s good.  
  
“Cool,” she says eventually. “Can I try it on?”  
  
You spend the next two hours ~~playing dress-up~~ exploring historical figures in a hands-on, interactive manner. It gets late, and at one point you yawn accidentally and then Nepeta yawns so wide that you can see the tunnel of her throat and every single one of her incredibly sharp teeth, and you trail off, completely forgetting what you were talking about.  
  
She rubs her eyes. “I’m getting tired. Do you have a spare recuperacoon or anything?”  
  
“Uh, no. Sorry.”  
  
“It’s okay. I know how to sleep without it.” She starts to list sideways, then curls up on the floor. She looks like she decided to go to sleep right then and there. You’re momentarily at a loss for words.  
  
Then she suddenly jolts upright. “Oh my god! We totally fur-got!”  
  
“Forgot what?”  
  
“This is a _sleepover._ We need to make blanket cocoons and turn off the lights and talk about trolls we want in our quadrants!”  
  
“No. No we don’t. That is definitely not a thing that we need to do.”  
  
“Yes we do! It’s purractically required! Vriskers, I need to see where you keep your blankets. Right now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i made a new [tumblr post](https://unintelligible-screaming.tumblr.com/post/163147765297/all-the-glories-of-fortune-chapter-5) for this chapter, if you'd like to like/reblog it. because it took me longer than unusual to post this chapter, i actually posted a snippet from it on my blog, which is something i'll be doing more of in the future, so if you get impatient and want more content faster you can check out [my writing tag](https://unintelligible-screaming.tumblr.com/tagged/unintelligible+scribbling).


	6. In the Dark

You’re slightly suspicious of Nepeta’s claims that is absolutely essential that you make a blanket cocoon next to hers, but you’ve never had a sleepover before and asking Troll Google “what do you need for a sleepover????????” yields contradictory answers, so you give in and follow her directions. She dims the lights and your respiteblock is shrouded in thick, comforting darkness. You lie down, and for a long, long moment, the only thing that exists in the world is the soft rasp of her breathing.  
  
She says, “We each have one quadrant filled, right? I have pale and you have pitch.”  
  
“Yep,” you say.  
  
Silence. Then she says, “Okay, you’ve got to give me more than _that_.”  
  
“I do what I want!”  
  
“But you’re sup-paw-sed to tell me all the dirty details.”  
  
You briefly picture what ‘dirty details’ might entail when it comes to Eridan, and then you fervently wish you hadn’t. “Hey, has your sweaty boyfriend invented any bleach that works on brains? Because that sentence you just said made me need it.”  
  
She giggles. “Fine. What quadrants do you _wish_ you had filled?”  
  
“I don’t want any other quadrants. I’m great on my own. If I were dating anyone else they’d only slow me down.”  
  
“That’s not true. Relationships help you. They make you better, not worse.”  
  
“Eh, maybe. Mostly they’re just another boooring thing to worry about when you could be doing something way more fun.”  
  
“Hmph!” You hear her twist around in her cocoon. “I think… I think I’d like to have a matesprit.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
For some reason, your pulse pounds harder. You feel it in your fingers and toes. Nepeta continues, “I’d like my matesprit to be nice, and maybe we could talk about our feelings and stuff. And do sappy things like give each other flowers and look at the stars on clear nights. Like people in the movies.”  
  
“Ugh, why would you want that? That sounds terrible. And boring too.”  
  
“No it’s not, It’s romantic! It’s okay to like things, you know. Sometimes you act like if you’re happy for more than three seconds you’ll get a rash.”  
  
“It’s not about liking things, it’s about reality. Romances like that don’t happen in real life.”  
  
“Oh yeah? What are they like, then? Since you have sooo much experience.”  
  
The smug way she drags out the sentence is a little too much like your own speech patterns, so you scowl into the dark. You can just barely pick out the dim shape of her horns, her hair, her closed eyelids. “Well, they definitely don’t involve _flowers_.” You say ‘flowers’ like some people might say ‘sea slugs’. “What, do you have someone specific in mind?”  
  
She goes quiet. Faintly, you see her push herself up on her forearms. She chews her lip, looking contemplative. “Well, yes.”  
  
You swallow. “You do?”  
  
“I have a bit of a crush on someone, you see.”  
  
“You do.”  
  
“You might know them, actually.”  
  
“I… might?”  
  
“Do you know Karkat?”  
  
A very complicated series of emotions sweeps through you, made more complicated by the fact that they steal your breath while leaving you completely unable to comprehend even a single one. You can’t speak for a moment, your tongue turned into lead. Finally you say, “ _Him?_ ”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“I don’t like him.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
“He’s pathetic and whiny. And boring. Why would you have a flushcrush on someone who’s boring? Why would you do that?”  
  
“He’s not,” she insists. “He always has interesting things to say—”  
  
“You think everyone has interesting things to say.”  
  
“Ugh, I knew you’d react like this. You’re as bad as Equihiss sometimes, you should form a club for mean, condescending bluebloods who like to loom over people a lot—I bet you’re being ridiculous because he stays hemoanonymous on the internet, or, or, or some other silly reason—”  
  
“I thought you said you wanted a matesprit who was nice!”  
  
“He is nice! Just, with the things he does, not the things he says.”  
  
“That doesn’t make any sense. Also, being nice is lame.”  
  
“Oh, shut up. He’s like you. He pretends to be surly and insulting, but when push comes to shove he helps people.”  
  
What you almost say is: _I’m sorry? Where did you get the idea that I help people?_ Then you realize: probably when you showed up and saved her from being mom’s dinner. She’s never seen you in a fight. She has no idea what your first instinct is when push comes to shove. You find that you don’t want to correct her. So you don’t say anything, because there’s a warm glow that starts in the pit of your stomach and spreads outward, and you don’t want it to go away.  
  
“Well, you help people sometimes, anyway,” she adds doubtfully, and your warm glow dies tragically.  
  
  
*  
  
  
Nepeta sleeps in. She’s still out cold an hour after you wake up, and you take a look at the bags under her eyes, consider the length of the journey from her home, and wonder when was the last time she was able to sleep without fear of being eaten by the local wildlife. You grab something from the thermal hull and eat it while wandering around the hive, restless. Eventually your boredom outweighs your sense of magnanimity and you nudge Nepeta with your foot until she startles awake.  
  
“I’ve got food if you want it,” you say.  
  
She rubs her face groggily. “Wh—? Oh… yeah…”  
  
You give her some cereal and she ignores the spoon in favor of drinking it straight from the bowl. “Wow,” you say. “I bet Equius hates when you do that.”  
  
She nods fondly. “You have no idea. Do you know when he’ll be back?”  
  
You think he might have said something about it, but you were paying attention to something else at the time, so you can’t recall. You shrug. “Do you wanna troll him or something?”  
  
She says yes, so you bring her your husktop and try not to be too obvious about peeking over her shoulder while she logs on to her account. From the skeptical look she gives you, it seems like you’re pretty obvious.  
  
\--  arsenicCatnip [AC] began trolling centaursTesticle [CT] \--  
  
AC: :33 < *ac sniffs around outside her cave. it s33ms that a certain someone has b33n hanging around out here!*  
AC: :33 < *from the scent ac thinks it might be a certain centaur-y someone!*  
AC: :33 < *ac wriggles happily as she follows the scent trail through the forest*  
AC: :33 < *and TACKLEPOUNCES her unsuspecting companion!*  
CT: D --> Hi  
AC: :33 < *ac rubs her cheek against his in gr33ting*  
CT: D --> We aren’t anywhere near each other  
AC: :33 < ughhhh can’t you try to have fun for ONCE in your sticky, sweaty life??  
CT: D --> Of course I can have fun  
CT: D --> I’m having fun right now as I track a herd of glorious musclebeasts galloping a% the plains  
CT: D --> It just so happens that my idea of fun doesn’t involve 100dicrous imaginary games for wrigglers  
  
“Harsh,” you comment. “What does A-Percent-Sign mean?”  
  
Nepeta ignores you.  
  
AC: :33 < tracking a herd or whatever is just as silly as anything i do!!!  
AC: :33 < you’re supposed to track things so you can hunt them, but you don’t like hunting things, so  
AC: :33 < what  
AC: :33 < you just track them down and then look at them a lot????  
CT: D --> Yes  
AC: :33 < that’s so silly  
CT: D --> No it’s not  
CT: D --> It’s a dignified pursuit  
AC: :33 < it is SO silly  
CT: D --> No  
AC: :33 < yes  
CT: D --> No  
AC: :33 < yes  
CT: D --> No  
AC: :33 < yes!! yes yes yes yes yes!!!!  
AC: :33 < *ac changes the subject gracefully, exactly as gracefully as she swishes her cute tail*  
AC: :33 < *ac asks ct when he will be back at his hive*  
CT: D --> Not for another few nights or so  
AC: :33 < oh ok  
AC: :33 < i’ll stay at vrisker’s until then  
CT: D --> What  
CT: D --> You will not do that, you will stay at your hive until I return  
AC: :33 < um sorry but i’m already here  
AC: :33 < i had to leave home in a hurry  
CT: D --> Why would you have to do that  
AC: :33 < i’ll explain later!  
  
“Or you could explain it to me now,” you point out, but she ignores you once again. You groan loudly and flop down in a chair, but even this display of boredom and tragic lack of attention-receiving doesn’t garner any sympathy.  
  
CT: D --> No, this is unacceptable  
CT: D --> I will return at once  
AC: :00 < WHAT WAIT you don't have to do that!!  
  
\-- centaursTesticle [CT] has ceased trolling arsenicCatnip [AC] \--


	7. Hunting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy vriska day here's a chapter!

It turns out that Nepeta came here without any survival gear or any advance notice because she’s on the feral culling list and she was running from imperial drones.   
  
This fact bursts out of her once Equius returns from his trip, after an hour and a half of the two of them arguing with each other, apparently without every stopping for air. You provide very helpful commentary from the sidelines, which they ignore. After he asks her why she couldn’t just stay in her hive (cave? cave-hive?) for the millionth time she finally says, arms waving over her head, “Because it’s a pile of rubble, okay? And I don’t know where Pounce is!”  
  
The block goes quiet after that. She’s glaring with eyes wide and tension all the way from her curled toes to her bunched up claws digging into her palms, angry in a defensive, vulnerable kind of way that you recognize. It makes you feel—some kind of way, so you lean forward and ask, “What? Who did it? Why didn’t you hunt them down?”  
  
“You can’t hunt a drone, Vriskers,” she says. “There’s too many and they’re too strong, and if you get one of them then efurry other drone in the empire will zoom down on you too. So I ran. Pounce de Leon went one way and I went the other and I didn’t stop until I got here.”  
  
Equius fiddles with his glasses. “The agents of the empire wish you dead? What could you have possibly done to arouse their wrath?”  
  
“I didn’t have to do anything. I’m not supposed to have a hive or a lusus or anything like that—I’m not registered on any of the lists for my area. The construction drones didn’t show up near me when I was a pupa. I don’t have a monthly caegar allowance or anything that anyone else has! Pounce used to hijack other trolls’ deliveries and bring me back food and clothes from other trolls’ hives so that I could eat and stay warm in the winter. She brought me schoolfeeds too, so that I could learn how to blend in and, y’know, use the internet and all those useful things.”  
  
“You’re _feral?”_ says Equius, disbelieving.  
  
“Ohhh,” you say, nodding as all the pieces fall together in your brain. “That explains a lot.”  
  
“What could it possibly explain?” he says.  
  
“Last morning,” you say to Nepeta, “when we were about to sleep, you nearly curled up on the floor. No sopor or anything. I thought it was kinda hardcore, but you’re just not used to recuperacoons, right?” Now that you think about it, that isn’t the first time she’s acted like she’s never previously encountered some perfectly ordinary facet of life, like coffee makers or battlebots. You always put it down to her being a lowblood or being raised by a lusus that didn’t spend much time personally taking care of its charge. You can relate. Not that your mom doesn’t take care of you. She does! She’s just—preparing you for the reality of Alternia, that’s all. You bet when the ordeals roll around you’ll be ten times as ready as any other wriggler in your age group.  
  
“My god, you’re feral,” repeats Equius, horrified. Nepeta shrinks away.   
  
You are suddenly angry. You’re not used to feeling angry on someone else’s behalf, so it’s a weird feeling. It puts something hot and scorching in the hollow beneath your lungs, like you’ve swallowed the sun and its rays will burn away your skin from the inside out unless you do something about it right here and now. You pick up the nearest heavy thing, a FLARP manual, and whack him on the side of the head.   
  
He stumbles back, blinking rapidly, like he can’t quite process what just happened. “That was uncalled for,” he says, once he recalls how to put one word in front of another.   
  
You are fuming. The burning sensation hasn’t quite gone away, although you feel a little silly now. “It was totally called for! By me! I’m the one who’s calling for it! You shouldn’t say that. It’s—” _Mean_ , you almost say, but that would definitely be silly. “—dumb,” you finish. To cover it up, you ask Nepeta, “So is your lusus lost forever or what?”  
  
Now Nepeta is shrinking away from you too. Hm. Maybe that was a little insensitive. (People get oddly hurt by simple questions like that, which you’ve been noticing more and more lately. It’s annoying, but you’ve been trying to work around it, since otherwise people talk to you less.) She’s got a stubborn tilt to her mouth as she says, “No she’s not. She’s going to be fine. We come here all the time, so it won’t be long befur she shows up here too.”   
  
With that, she pushes past the two of you and goes upstairs to the block where your blanket cocoons are still strewn across the floor. You and Equius are left in awkward silence, avoiding each other’s gazes.  
  
  
*  
  
  
Pounce does not show up at either yours or Equius’ hive in the next perigee. Nepeta oscillates between being irrepressibly upbeat and looking small and lost. You’re starting to realize that she is somehow illuminated in your mind in a way you find difficult to put into words. She is highlighted, foregrounded, like when a ray of moonlight falls on a blade of grass and it is suddenly more important than all the other blades of grass. Small details about her capture your attention, such as the two messy curls that escape her attempts to tuck her hair behind her ears or the way she bounces on her feet in impatience or excitement.   
  
The longer she spends in your company the more she learns about your lusus. She tries to talk to you about it, but you hate the careful tone she has whenever she brings it up, as if it’s something delicate, so you brush her off.   
  
On a number of occasions, you catch her rubbing eye sockets tinted green with recently shed tears as her lusus continually fails to appear. It frustrates you, mostly because you don’t know how to fix it for her, but sometimes for other reasons. One night when the other reasons are burning in the foreground of your brain, you snap at her, “Stop moping! Grow up. Admit it, she’s never coming back. What, are you a little wriggler that can’t handle not having your mom around?”  
  
For a second you think she’s gonna punch you in the face. She’s been spending enough time around you, it’s entirely plausible that she would have picked up a few of your instincts. She’s furious.   
  
You regret opening your mouth. “Hey,” you say. “I didn’t mean it. I’m sure she’ll—I’m—” You can’t say _I’m sure she’ll turn up_ because you don’t think she will. She probably got snapped up by a lusus-thief like the bandits that take strong, manageable lusii and sell them as pack-beasts off-planet, or by a lusus-hunter like Eridan. Instead your mouth says the first thing that springs to your tongue: “Let’s go and scout the woods near your old hive. We can track her.”  
  
She hesitates. “I already asked Equihiss. He thinks it’s too dangerous with the drones all ofur the place. We could be culled.”  
  
“What, are you scared?”  
  
It’s a shame that Equius is the only one among you three who really knows how to track creatures, but if _he_ can do it, it can’t be that hard, right? You’re pretty confident you can pick it up as you go along.


End file.
